Wave of Terror

by Jon Jefferson

  “Santayana,” Vreeland said.

  “Excuse me?”

  “Churchill didn’t say that.” Vreeland’s voice seemed a degree cooler. “It’s widely misattributed. It was the philosopher Santayana who said it. By the way, you’re misquoting as well as misattributing.” He smirked. “I double-majored—history and philosophy.” Dawtry heard a few chuckles, and he glanced around nervously. What he saw, in every set of eyes now, was avid, predatory cunning.

  “But I digress,” Vreeland added genially. “What lessons of history have we failed to learn?” His colleagues—the other wolves in his pack—leaned forward.

  Dawtry swallowed hard. “Consider the World Trade Center towers. Look, I’m not here to point fingers—at your agency or at mine—but in hindsight, obviously, we failed to connect the dots. And failed to communicate effectively. Which is why this interagency liaison position was created after 9/11. That was a huge step in the right direction.”

  “Yes, thank heavens for it,” said Vreeland. “However else would we learn from history, with all the blind spots that interfere with our ability to read, and to see the big picture?”

  Dawtry’s armpits were pouring sweat now. That’s it, he thought. They’ve read the memo, and I’m cooked. “Well. Anyhow,” he stumbled on, “I’ve been looking back at 9/11, and also looking at our current intelligence gathering.” As if to compensate for his swampy underarms, his mouth was as dry as Death Valley. “I’m wondering if we’re not spending so much time and so many resources examining trees that we’re losing sight of the forest.” He paused, hoping for a question, but when one came, he wished it hadn’t.

  “What a delightful bonus,” said the man on Vreeland’s left, who happened to be Vreeland’s division chief. “History and forestry. Speaking as one of the benighted scrutinizers of bark and branches, I would love to be enlightened as to the nature of the forest. What do you see from your lofty perch?”

  Dawtry reddened. “That was a poor choice of metaphor,” he said. “Forgive me. What I mean . . . what concerns me . . . is that we—and by ‘we,’ I mean our nation’s leaders, our policy makers, even our citizens—we seem to be acting as if the new norm of terrorism is now the only norm.”

  “The new norm?” The question, accompanied by raised eyebrows, came from Vreeland.

  Dawtry nodded. “The lone wolf. The small cell. The microattack. A jihadist drives a car into a crowd, mows down a dozen people. A neo-Nazi opens fire in a black church in Charleston. A shooter sets up a sniper’s nest on the thirty-second floor of a Vegas hotel. More and more, we’re focusing our resources on finding and stopping these low-level attacks.”

  “And in your view, that’s unnecessary.” It was a statement, not a question, from the man seated on Vreeland’s right. He was thin and hawkish, his cheekbones sharp as blades, his steel-rimmed glasses glinting with reflections that hid his eyes.

  “No. No. Preventing lone-wolf attacks is necessary, to the degree that we can do it. But it’s not sufficient. Let me go back to the World Trade Center.”

  “Really?” Vreeland’s voice dripped sarcasm. “Your vision of the future is rooted in the year 2001?”

  Dawtry could feel his bridge burning behind him—and ahead of him. And beneath his feet as well. What the hell, he thought. I’ve already screwed the pooch here. Might as well speak my piece. “Actually, a lot earlier than that. It’s also important to remember 1993—the first World Trade Center bombing. A truck filled with explosives, parked in the underground garage. The plan was to topple the North Tower like a tree—smash it into the South Tower to bring down both. Obviously—luckily—it didn’t work, but it would have, if the truck had been parked closer to the foundation wall.” The faces around the table were stony. “The blast caused heavy damage to the garage, but it killed only six people. Things go fairly quiet for seven years—mostly microattacks, right? But then in 2000, bam, another audacious attack, this time on the USS Cole—an American warship, for God’s sake. Ballsy, but only a warm-up. Eleven months later, down come the twin towers, a global symbol of American hubris. That event changed the world, maybe as powerfully as Hiroshima and Nagasaki did. It revealed that the American homeland was vulnerable to attacks. To mass-casualty attacks.” Dawtry held out both hands, palms upturned. “How many people died on September 11?” He looked around for an answer, but no one responded. They weren’t giving him a thing. “Three thousand. That’s a lot—it’s three thousand too many. But because they died in a single attack—a dramatic, iconic, and telegenic attack, shown again and again around the world, the reaction was extraordinary. We were terrified. We went to war in Iraq and Afghanistan. We dialed back on civil liberties. We started conducting mass surveillance of our own citizens. We ignored the Geneva Conventions against torture and unlawful confinement.”

  Vreeland cocked his head. “I understand your brother died in one of the towers.” Dawtry felt his face flush. “Terrible, of course,” Vreeland added coolly. “But I wonder if that skews your thinking. Makes you prone to apocalyptic fears.”

  You bastard, Dawtry thought. “Of course it skews my thinking,” he said. “But just because I’m paranoid, that doesn’t mean they’re not out to get us in big, dramatic ways.”

  “Help me understand this,” said Vreeland’s boss. “We took out Osama bin Laden in 2011. We’ve conducted hundreds of drone strikes—in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Yemen, Syria, Somalia, Iraq—and killed thousands of jihadists. Al-Qaeda is dead on the table, and ISIS is on the run. What is it you think we’re missing?”

  “I’m not so sure al-Qaeda’s dead,” Dawtry shot back. “Maybe they’re just deep underground. What about bin Laden’s second-in-command, al-Zawahiri? We’ve still never gotten him. We’ve been after him ever since 9/11, and he’s still on the loose. And bin Laden’s son is now grown and calling for more attacks. But let’s not get stuck on Qaeda. My point is, we’ve stopped looking for the next ‘spectacular’ attack. The next out-of-the-box, pie-in-the-sky, world-changing attack.”

  “And where do you suggest we look for that?” asked Vreeland.

  Dawtry shrugged. “That’s the puzzle, right? The black swan. The operation so audacious and outlandish it’s inconceivable . . . until it’s already happened. Until we’re picking up the bodies.” He drew a deep breath to steady himself. It didn’t work. “The terrorists have already weaponized vehicles and airliners and even skyscrapers. We know they’re interested in weaponizing nuclear power plants. What’s next—DC’s public water supply? The Superdome during the Super Bowl? The Verrazano-Narrows Bridge during the New York City marathon? Or something even worse—unthinkably worse—than any of those scenarios? We’ve got to start thinking like they do, only better. We’ve got to put more resources into finding and stopping the Next Big Thing.”

  “Of course,” said Vreeland drily. “I’ll ask NASA to check the dark side of the moon Monday morning, in case SPECTRE has installed a giant rocket thruster there, to crash the moon into Manhattan.” His comment was rewarded with smirks all around the table. Vreeland glanced around, evidently gratified by the reaction. Then he placed both palms on the table and stood up. “Gentlemen, I believe that pretty well covers it. Thank you for the history lesson, Special Agent Dawtry. We’ll be in touch.”

  Dawtry nodded. He mumbled his thanks and made his way out of the building and across the courtyard, past the Kryptos sculpture, and out to the visitor parking lot, where his black Tahoe sat ready to take him away from the new job he wouldn’t be getting. It had been his to lose, and he’d lost it.

  As he approached the guard booth at the exit, still in a fog of dejection, Dawtry glimpsed movement to his left. He hit the brakes just in time to avoid slamming into a bicycle that hurtled off the curb and landed directly in his path. The cyclist had not even glanced to check for traffic. Dawtry gave the horn a peevish toot; in response, the cyclist took his hands off the handlebars, sat bolt upright, and raised both middle fingers high in the air. “Yeah, thanks for the signal, asshole,” D
awtry muttered. He was about to gun the throttle and intercept the guy to discuss cycling safety and etiquette when he noticed an odd, shiny reflection. In lieu of a helmet, the cyclist’s head appeared to be crowned with the world’s largest Hershey’s Kiss: a ten-inch silver dome whose top swirled upward into a graceful tapering tip. Looking closer, Dawtry glimpsed a miniature fencelike structure encircling the rim, constructed of three-inch spikes linked by wire mesh.

  Huh, Dawtry thought, shifting his transmission into “Park.” He got out, approached the door of the guard shack, and tapped the glass. One of the two guards turned and gave Dawtry an annoyed look before opening the door. “Can I help you?”

  “Radiohead,” said Dawtry, pointing. “The guy on the bike who nearly T-boned me. Not one of yours, I’m guessing?”

  The guard shook his head. “Not hardly. But not for lack of trying. We see him every Friday, rain or shine. Four o’clock on the dot.”

  “Impressively methodical. What does he want?”

  “Dunno,” said the guard. “He’s not authorized to tell me. Says he has a top-secret message for the director’s ears only.”

  Dawtry gave a slight smile. “Maybe he does.”

  The guard grunted. “The director actually came out here one Friday. He’d heard stories about this guy, so one Friday, at five to four, the director shows up and waits.”

  “Yeah, right.”

  “Gospel truth. Captain Tinfoil pedals up five minutes later, and the director steps outside—which I strongly advised him not to do, by the way. ‘Hello,’ he says. ‘I hear you have an important message for me.’ Captain Tinfoil looks him up and down, then yells, ‘Guard. Guard!’ I hustle out, my service weapon drawn, ’cause I don’t like how this is going down. ‘This man is an imposter,’ says Captain Tinfoil. ‘Arrest him immediately!’ So I step up to the director, grab him by the elbow, and say, ‘Sir, you need to come with me. And don’t give me any trouble.’ I start hauling him inside, and at the door, I turn around and give Captain Tinfoil a salute with my weapon. He returns the salute, then pedals away until the next Friday.”

  Dawtry furrowed his brow skeptically. “You wouldn’t be shitting a gullible G-man here, would you?”

  The guard laid a hand on his heart. “Swear to God. You don’t believe me, ask him yourself.”

  “Who, the director?”

  The guard snorted and shook his head, then pointed. “The guy pedaling onto the GW Parkway right now. If you miss him, you can find him later at the group home near the zoo.”

  Dawtry had no clue where the group home was, but he knew exactly where the zoo was: a quarter mile up Connecticut from his own condo. He and Radiohead were practically neighbors. “You actually know where he lives?”

  “Woodley House. Room 202.” Dawtry raised an eyebrow; the guard shrugged nonchalantly. “We have a few skills.”

  “You track all the loonies?”

  “Nah, just the ones that stand out,” the guard said. “Though you can’t always judge a book by its cover.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Crazy comes in all shapes and sizes,” the guard said. “Ten minutes ago, we had another one. Looked like a soccer mom who just took the wrong exit. Well dressed, good-looking. Driving a Prius with a peace sign and a faded Hillary Clinton bumper sticker.” The guard chuckled. “I guess that should’ve been my first clue.”

  The car, the peace sign, or the Hillary sticker? wondered Dawtry. “What brought her here, besides the hybrid?”

  “The moon and the stars.”

  “Come again?”

  “She’s an astrologer.”

  “Astrologer?”

  “Age of Aquarius, all that shit. Apparently, our national horoscope is headed for the crapper. She lost me pretty quick, but long story short, she studies the stars, and she’s figured out that the terrorists can control the forces of nature now. Earthquakes, volcanoes, the ocean. They’re about to turn Kansas into beachfront property.”

  Dawtry smiled. “I guess you and I should start buying up cow pastures.”

  “I guess so.” The guard held up a finger—hang on a sec—and reached behind him, into the booth. He thrust a large manila envelope at Dawtry. “Here. She left this. Says it explains everything.”

  Dawtry frowned at the envelope. “I can’t take that.”

  “Sure you can,” said the guard. “I saw your title on the visitor list. You’re a counterterrorism guy. Weapons of mass destruction. Earthquakes and volcanic eruptions—that’s about as mass as destruction gets.”

  “But she brought it here. She gave it to you. It’s CIA material.” A horn beeped; Dawtry saw three cars backed up behind him and more on the way. “Looks like quitting time,” he said. “Guess I better get out of the way.”

  He clambered back into the Tahoe. Just as he began tugging the door shut, something spun past his face, a corner tickling the tip of his nose, as the manila envelope whirled into the vehicle. It thwacked against the passenger door, then slid to the floor on the far side of the seat.

  “It’s Bureau material now,” the guard said, grinning. “Have a great weekend.” He stepped back, waving Dawtry forward through the gate, off the property, and away from the scene where his career had self-destructed.

  The exit road curved away from the wooded campus and spat Dawtry onto the GW Parkway. As he merged, joining the torrent of traffic that flowed in parallel with the Potomac, he kept one eye peeled for a cyclist wearing a shiny, spiky helmet. Consequently, he paid no attention to the car parked on the road’s shoulder. It was only after he was well past it that its details registered on his distracted mind: the car had been a metallic-green Prius with a Hillary bumper sticker and a peace sign, and sitting behind the wheel had been a woman. A good-looking, well-dressed woman who might have been a soccer mom and who also, he realized belatedly, might have been weeping, her face buried in her hands, slumped on the steering wheel.

  Dawtry slid the plate away, pissed at himself for wasting the food. The chicken tikka masala was half-eaten, the sauce congealed; the garlic naan had gone cold and limp, the Kingfisher warm and flat. He beckoned to the server, Sanjay, and handed him a twenty, then pushed back his chair and stood.

  Sanjay frowned at the uneaten meal. “Is there a problem with the food? Usually we don’t even need to wash your plate when you’ve finished.”

  “No, the food was fine, Sanjay. The problem is me. I had a bad day. I’m in a foul mood.”

  “I am sorry to hear it. It must be a very foul mood indeed if even Indian food can’t fix it.”

  “True.” Dawtry managed a half smile at the joke. “I’ll make up for it next time.” He lifted a hand in a gloomy farewell and walked outside.

  Connecticut Avenue was gridlocked with typical Friday evening traffic. Dawtry headed south from the restaurant, turned left onto Calvert, and headed for home, a block away. Then he stopped. “Well, shit,” he muttered, then reversed course, back to Connecticut, and north.

  He passed the Indian restaurant, passed the sushi bar, passed the Italian place and the coffee shop and a dozen other spendy establishments catering to the affluent, fortunate residents of Cleveland Park. Halfway between the Metro station and the zoo, just beyond a cheaply stuccoed apartment tower, Dawtry stopped, turning to study a low, wide town house. It was the sort of stodgy brick structure built back in the 1920s, back before Connecticut got expensive and built up.

  The building was set back from the sidewalk by ten feet, with a tiny lawn—an honest-to-god little lawn—and a few scrubby bushes, plus a couple of pots of forlorn begonias on the front steps. From the outside, there was nothing to indicate the nature of the place or its residents, but the address and the architecture matched what Dawtry had found on Google.

  He climbed the steps. The solid front door—painted white, protected by a glass-paneled storm door—was framed by narrow panes of glass spilling warm golden light. The night was turning cold, and the panes were fogged with condensation. Dawtry leaned to his left and
risked a peek inside, but the condensation, plus a set of sheers, screened the entry hall from his prying eyes. What the hell am I doing here? he wondered. Then he rang the doorbell.

  He listened for footsteps, but the cacophonous traffic on Connecticut would have drowned out even gunfire. After a few moments, a shadow flitted across the sheers, and then the peephole in the door—glowing like a cat’s-eye—winked dark for a count of five, then brightened again.

  A dead bolt rattled and the heavy door opened a foot. A woman somewhere north of middle age, gray hair pulled back in a bun, peered around the edge. “Yes?”

  “Sorry to bother you, ma’am,” said Dawtry.

  What?” she shouted over the din. She looked Dawtry up and down, assessing the potential threat, then said, “Oh, just a minute. Hold on.” She fumbled with the lock on the storm door, then opened it. “Yes?”

  “Sorry to bother you,” he began again. “I understand this is a group home, is that right?”

  Her eyes narrowed warily. “How can I help you?”

  “I believe you have a resident, a gentleman, who has—how to put this?—interesting taste in hats.”

  She closed her eyes and heaved a visible sigh. “Oh Lord. Is Benny in trouble again? What’s he done now?”

  “No, ma’am, he’s not in trouble. Not at all. I apologize for worrying you. I just . . . I ran into him today, you might say, and I was . . . interested. I wondered if I might talk to him.”

  She studied him again: the short, neat haircut, the starched dress shirt, the cinched tie, the long overcoat. “You’re from the CIA,” she announced, her voice flat and weary.

  “No, ma’am, I’m not.”

  “It’s Friday,” she went on, ignoring his response. “He was there again, wasn’t he?” She glanced behind her. Dawtry followed her gaze and saw two women peering from the far end of the hall. The gray-haired woman stepped onto the porch, closing the storm door behind her. “Look, I know he can be a pest, but he really is harmless. I wish you people could get that through your heads.” Her voice was both challenging and pleading.